DEATHWATCH, a collection of two novellas by Lisa Mannetti
Shadowfall Publications
December 17th, 2010
Both novellas focus thematically on broken childhoods and are set in the 19th century; and the total word count is around 50,000.
In the first work, Dissolution, Stuart Granville is a would-be medical student from the South who's been sent down for drinking and believes he's heading north to Hyde Park, New York to tutor twin girls. Instead, he discovers that his charges, Abby and Eleanor, not only have never been to school of any kind, but that they are Siamese twins their father, a doctor with grandiose dreams, means to separate surgically, taking advantage of Stuart's expertise and his vulnerability--as well as the supernatural forces at work in the house itself.
In The Sheila Na Gig, Tom Smith is on a ship in steerage and bound for New York from his native Ireland after facing down the the constraints imposed by his family, overcoming the loss of his first love, circumventing his grandmother's wiles and occult knowledge, and trying to save his younger, mentally challenged sister, Delia, from both witchcraft and sexual abuse.